Humans have big plans for mining in space — but there are many things holding us back

[Admin]

Setting up any kind of off-Earth mining industry will be no small feat. Let's look at what we're up against.

Humans have big plans for mining in space — but there are many things holding us back : Read more

 

[Unclear Engineer]

"Other proposals are more unfamiliar — such as using a vacuum-like machine(opens in new tab) to pull regolith up a tube (which has seen limited use in excavation on Earth)."

Not understanding how a vacuum-like machine would suck something out of the vacuum of space. Maybe on Mars. Would probably melt on Venus. And Jupiter's moons seem awfully far away.

For those who don't want to watch the full 27 minutes of the linked video, go to 19 minutes, and you will be where the "vacuum" system is described. The discussion starts as a vacuum and sort of morphs into a pneumatic system, where gas is injected, not just sucked out of nothing. But, still, gas is not going to be cheap in a gasless environment, so some sort of recycling would probably be needed to make this one "fly".